Fond Baptiste, Haiti

I don’t even know where to start right now. For those of you who have been following since we started about a year and a half ago, you can probably understand the weight of this more than others. On January 12, 2010 a massive earthquake rocked Port Au Prince, Haiti killed thousands and destroying most of the city and surrounding areas. It was a Tuesday and when we all woke up it was everywhere you looked. Television, Internet, Twitter, Facebook, and all other media outlets were talking about it. Of course a number to donate money to the Red Cross was splattered everywhere and as a nation America stepped up and took charge of helping Haiti out. That’s where Love Come Rescue was birthed. In that moment we knew we needed to help in any way we could. So after an email and facebook message by my friend Josh Street (Part of Love Come Rescue Team), people had a place to help support Haiti. We gathered an entire 18-Wheeler full of supplies within a few days and next thing we knew they were off on a plane headed to Haiti. Ever since then we had a dream to see where those supplies went and who they were helping. Since January 2010 we have had somewhere around 12 or 13 opportunities to travel to Haiti, all of which have fallen through for some reason. We created an organization focused on Haiti support but soon found that we would focus on Kenya Africa instead, or at least at first.

The week the earthquake hit we met a woman named Sharron Etheridge who attends our church who was a missionary in Haiti for 20 years. While in Haiti she had the opportunity to be somewhat of a foster mother of several Haitian children, one of which was named Roberto. We heard about Roberto while shooting an interview with Sharron a few days after the earthquake slammed Port Au Prince and afterwards we found out that Roberto was currently working with an organization in the city but that he was wanting to return to his home village of Port Au Prince to continue the work Sharron had done for so many years helping the people of the community. After traveling to Africa last summer and us partnering with the 410 Bridge we shared Roberto’s story knowing that 410 was about to start doing work in Haiti. A few months later on a trip down to visit some communities several 410 staff members luckily got to meet with Roberto after finding out their flight had been delayed. His vision seemed to line up perfectly with 410?s strategy and when we heard we knew one day we would get to meet Roberto in person and start a relation that would last for years to come. Now we are here, in May of 2011, months after preparing and figuring out logistics and it’s time to meet Roberto. Josh Street and I will finally be able to live out what we dreamed to do a year and a half ago as we drive to Tallahassee tomorrow morning at 4am. We’ll be traveling to Haiti for 5 days to meet Roberto and start building relationships in the community of Fond Baptiste. As we found out during our preparation, there aren’t any hotels nearby as we’ll be in the mountains of southern Haiti, so we’ll be camping in 90 degree weather while it rains everyday and becoming mountain men for the week. I can say this is a first for me and for Josh but we are extremely stoked and can’t wait to come back and start sending teams back to meet the people of Haiti. We won’t have any internet or electricity for that matter so we won’t be able to post any updates, but as soon as we get back we will be posting pics and a blog or two of the trip. If you could be praying not just for Josh and I, but also for the community of Fond Baptiste, that God start to build strong relationships between them and us so that we will be able to continue to partner along side them and help build them up as a community. We are out for now, but will see you all in a week!